Singapore
Singapore
Recently, a slew of new technology like Augmented Reality (AR) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) have taken the world by storm. Similar to its cousin, Virtual Reality (VR), AR allows for new ways to interact with the world, broadening the limits of gaming, entertainment or day-to-day life. And as it tends to happen with the nature of up-and-coming tech tools, businesses soon follow suit, and the earliest adopters stand only to gain from their head start.
AR can change the way we approach business, creating new ways to engage with our co-workers, consumers or the world around us. With an opportunity to provide customers with a fully immersive experience that’s built around your product and its stories, businesses are no longer confined to the physical world.
Perhaps most notably, AR has proven its worth in the retail space, and could soon perhaps do away with the need for physical showrooms altogether. IKEA has adopted AR so customers can better visualise how their furniture might fit in their house. With AR, previously disparate but important pieces of information can be integrated into one seamless environment.
Beyond retail, the future of AR could potentially change the way businesses are run. From remote collaboration to augmented office spaces, the possibilities are endless.
AI refers broadly to the capability of machines to imitate intelligent human behaviour. By identifying applicable and insightful patterns too time-consuming for humans to find, Machine Learning has been assisting businesses towards a greater understanding of their customers.
As a fully digital company with over 100 million users worldwide, Spotify’s success is largely data-driven, using AI and Machine Learning to acquire invaluable knowledge on their pool of users. As the service acquires more information, machines are trained to listen to the music, and extrapolate intel that impacts the business, its users and the industry alike.
When it comes to digital marketing, AI technologies can sieve through heaps of data you may have collected from your customers, telling you only the most relevant information so ad spends can be optimised more effectively.
These days, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone without a smartphone. With the rise of voice-activated personal assistants like Apple’s Siri and Amazon’s Alexa, voice search is changing the way we search for, and receive information. With voice search, users no longer have to distill searches into keywords for a search engine to understand. By voice-optimising your online assets, such websites, services or review pages will increase the likelihood that your business gets picked up by relevant voice searches.
Since most voice searches seek local information, start by completing a Google My Business listing. Beyond website, address and contact number, try to provide more information on the business or services and reviews so Google can identify unique attributes.
To sum it up, the next phase of digital transformation lies in the ability to integrate business goals with technology, people and resources. Businesses must prepare for the future of digitisation in order to stay competitive, or risk getting left behind.
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